A panel discussion will held tonight, 6 p.m. Monday, Oct. 16, at Zeitgeist (18618 Oretha Castle Haley Blvd.) to explore themes found in local filmmaker Maggie Hadleigh-West's documentary Sick to Death!, which had its wold premiere at the New Orleans Film Festival on Saturday night. Based on Hadleigh-West's personal experiences with thyroid disease, the film explores the "complications, negligence and corruption" of the medical establishment as regards diagnosis and treatment of the illness.

In addition to Hadleigh-West, panelists include Dr. Kent Holtorf, founder of the National Academy of Hyperthyroidism; author and thyroid patient advocate Mary Shomon; Jeny Kherkher, Executive Director of the Holtorf Medical Group; and health chef and educator Jodi Brown.

Sick to Death! will receive an encore screening as part of this year's New Orleans Film Festival at 6 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 18 at the Ace Hotel. More information is here.

LaToya Cantrell (left) and Desiree Charbonnet, who will be advancing to a Nov. 18 runoff for the New Orleans mayoralty, addressing supporters at their election night parties.

LaToya Cantrell and Desiree Charbonnet are headed to a Nov. 18 runoff to determine which candidate will become the first woman mayor in New Orleans history.

Charbonnet, a Gentilly native and former municipal court judge, received 30 percent of the vote and celebrated with a party at the New Orleans Hilton Riverside, with longtime allies former Mayor Sidney Barthelemy and Constable Lambert Boissiere in the crowd, along with District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro, who came out early for Charbonnet's candidacy. Also giving interviews was U.S. Rep. Cedric Richmond, another Charbonnet supporter.

"We have taken lots of fire, lots of hard, hard hits," she said, referring to two anti-Charbonnet campaigns that were active in recent weeks. "They tried to threaten us and even smear us with those old stereotypes. We refused to be bullied or accept the status quo."

Cantrell, the current District B Councilwoman who received 39 percent of the vote, celebrated with a party at the New Orleans Jazz Market, the site of her original campaign announcement, As a DJ spun celebratory funk from Kool and the Gang and McFadden and Whitehead, the crowd at the New Orleans Jazz Market danced while watching poll results roll out on local news and cheering as Cantrell's numbers ticked up.

Following a lively gospel choir and band, Cantrell stood behind the podium onstage, surrounded by family and supporters and facing a crowd chanting "give 'em hell, Cantrell." Among the crowd onstage were state Sen. Karen Carter Peterson, state Rep. Neil Abramson and outgoing District A Councilmember Susan Guidry

You can improve your local neutral ground (or vacant lot) tomorrow by taking down signs from the candidates who don't make the cut in today's election. The group Paper Monuments is organizing a scavenger hunt for as-of-Sunday obsolete campaign signs, with a dropoff Sunday from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. at Kermit's Mother-in-Law Lounge.

The winning team (the one with the most campaign detritus) wins cookies.

Friday, October 13, 2017

A towering figure in the social and cultural histories of the U.S., Thurgood Marshall may have been the most effective legal tactician of his time. At age 45, Marshall won the landmark 1954 Brown v. Board of Education case before the U.S. Supreme Court that ended segregation in public schools and paved the way for the civil rights movement of the 1960s. He became the first African-American Supreme Court justice in 1967 and was a beacon of social progress throughout his 24-year tenure on the Court.

Marshall’s extraordinary life and career make him a prime candidate for the kind of well-intentioned but superficial biopic often churned out by Hollywood, even when an incisive documentary seems a far better idea. Fortunately for all concerned, director Reginald Hudlin’s Marshall is not that film.

On the premiere of her new Hulu talk show I Love You, America, Sarah Silverman visited the Standers family of Chalmette to have dinner and talk politics.

Last night, on Sarah Silverman's new Hulu series I Love You, America, the famously liberal comedian tried something different in the late-night talk show field: she visited a family of Trump voters in Chalmette and had dinner with them.

The Standers are an extended family of crab fishermen — gun owners and conservatives who voted for change in the 2016 election. Their beliefs were varied; Brandi, the 26-year-old "matriarch," wasn't convinced that former President Barack Obama was born in Hawaii, yet she was firmly in support of gay marriage and chided her father, who said LGBT people should have equal rights but stopped short of supporting the right to marry. Most of the Standers thought the Obama administration "gave away" too many things to the undeserving, yet several of them received insurance under the expansion of the Affordable Care Act. Silverman made her points known, but there was no serious arguing (and no changing of minds, either). Everyone involved seemed to enjoy the experience; they parted as friends.

It was a big change from the usual Stephen Colbert/John Oliver/Trevor Noah approach of ALL TRUMP IS BAD — and still not everyone liked it.

Tickets are now available for Star Wars: The Last Jedi, episode eight in the main Star Wars saga introduced by George Lucas in 1977. The film opens officially on Dec. 15 but preview screenings begin the night before, locally at the Broad, Prytania, Canal Place, Elmwood, Clearview and West Bank theaters. Tickets for screenings at all theaters are available here.

The first full trailer for the film arrived this week and apparently broke records with what Disney/LucasFilm claims was more than 120 million viewings in its first 24 hours. You can add to that total below.

New Orleans demonstrators rallied to support DACA and immigrant communities in September.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) is not convinced the New Orleans Police Department (NOPD) complies with federal immigration rules, despite Mayor Mitch Landrieu's repeated assurance that policies limiting officers' involvement in immigration issues are well within bounds.

In a letter to Landrieu, Acting Assistant U.S. Attorney General Alan Hanson said NOPD policies — which include preventing officers from inquiring about immigration status — "may violate" a section of federal law involving local authorities communicating with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). unless it can prove that the policy does not "restrict New Orleans officers and employees from requesting information regarding immigration status from federal immigration officers."